NewsTrust: Wisdom of the . . .Few

From where I sit, NewsTrust is like Digg for thinking people–a way for an engaged, attentive usership to surface high quality journalism on a website for the world to see. Great premise. Solid execution. [Excellent usability!]

But. . .there are precious few contributors. The story that has the most user ratings–a widely-renowned, much circulated, 13-screen [!] New Yorker opus titled The Joshua Generation by editor David Remnick–has been reviewed 12 times. Most stories on NewsTrust have between 2 and 4 reviews.

NewsTrust is a non-profit organization, funded largely by grants and donations from, among others, the MacArthur Foundation. Its advisers and supporters include esteemed members of the digitelligencia.  It intends to become a self-sustaining business at some point. [Interest revealed: I used to work for PBS Engage, a NewsTrust partner, and have exchanged friendly e-mails with NT founder and digital pioneer Fabrice Florin.]

I’m sure there are ways to read the metrics–page views, stories reviewed, etc.–that make a case for the project’s value and success. I do not question that.

My interest is less with NewsTrust than with how it illustrates what I have come to consider an inviolable law of social networks: People will participate in a network only if they get more from it than they are required to give. Participation is premised on an implicit exchange of value, with the user coming out on top.

This may seem obvious–newsflash! people act in their own self-interest!. But many social networks fail to abide this rule–and fail.

Here’s a cost-vs.-benefit rundown on NewsTrust.

I submit a news story I think is particularly good. [This is easier when it's published on a NewsTrust partner site, such as The Washington Post, which includes a NewsTrust button along with the other save-and-share options such as del.icio.us, Digg, etc. ]

I rate the story, according to 6 criteria (”quick” review”), 10 criteria (”full”) or 13 (”advanced”). Ratings are from 1 to 5.

Doing this responsibly requires me to go back and re-read it carefully, to rate aspects like “sourcing” or “fairness” or completeness, which I probably hadn’t really thought about when I decided the story was really good. [I can skip anything other than a quick 1-to-5 quality rating if I like.]

Then I submit it.

My review gains value only if more than three other people rate the story I’ve submitted–and even then hardly rises to prominence where it can have much influence on site users, much less the broad reading public.

My contribution? At least 5 minutes of high-grade intellectual energy. [More like an hour if I actually read that whole damn Remnick thing online. I'll print it out. It sounds really good.] Another surfing distraction that keeps me from my paying work. A little more swelling in the ol’ carpal tunnel.

The value I’ve gotten back? Hmmm. . .a hope that a few people will read a story I think is unusually worthy? The mild satisfaction one gets from inflicting one’s opinion into a public forum? The recognition I get if I do a lot of reviews and people review my reviews highly?

Even though I’m a civic-minded guy–plus a former newshand who believes strongly in the public value of high-quality journalism–that’s too low a reward-to-effort ratio to earn my regular participation. I feel like I’m being asked to do a lot of homework for a class I’m just auditing.

A thriving community where thousands of people elevate the best journalism to the public’s eye would be an enormous national benefit. I hope NewsTrust can identify people who get the psychic payback they’d need to contribute regularly. Or that it can somehow alter the value proposition to the user’s benefit.

Maybe I’m too close to this situation to be objective.

As it happens, I am a contributor to a non-profit online effort called HealthNewsReview.  We rank health and medical news stories according to 10 criteria similar to NewsTrust’s. We also have a hard time getting users to offer their opinions on our bulletin board. We also struggle to build audience for this important effort beyond a core of folks who follow medical news very closely.

So why do I devote the time and energy to writing these long and difficult health and medical news reviews?

I wish I could say I made these contributions selflessly, in the name of the public good.

But, well. . .they pay me to do them.